A (a dude, in midst of an actual conversation): Wait, Deb Olin Unferth isn’t famous.
C (another dude): She’s not? Of course she is. She’s famous.
A: Famous why? Because she had a book out with McSweeney’s and was in Harper’s?
C: People know who she is.
A: Writers know who she is. That’s not famous.
C: Famous, fine. She’s a buzzball. People talk about her. She’s famous enough.
B (a jew dude): Nobody is famous unless my grandmother knows who it is.
C: So are there any famous writers?
B: Philip Roth.

Electric Literature in the NY Times.  Geez.

Rick Moody is doing a story over 3 days via Twitter. Incorporating technology into literature all willy-nilly is bad for literary innovation.

“National Book Critics Circle”

Better at mean than me.

RT @markleidner doing anything is automatically embarrassing

Years ago I used to think the advice ‘tell the truth but tell it slant’ meant that you were supposed to be smarter than your reader, and that telling it slant meant weird or funny. Then I stopped thinking that, and less years ago started thinking that it means you are supposed to be smarter than yourself, and that the show is out of your control, and when you stop trying to tell the truth so hard the truth will come out of your sound. Now I don’t know what I think, and don’t want to, and that seems better than the other two entirely.

Click through anywhere to read the whole piece.

I’m a nurse, and I’ve seen the worst the system has to offer.

I remember Jim. He had worked all his life in a factory in Zeeland, Michigan. The latest round of layoffs had left him without insurance or savings.

Jim had an infection throughout his body that was serious, but treatable. After a few days, the billing department made their way to his room to discuss options with him.

The hospital was by no means telling him he had to go. Several doctors spoke with him about the severity of his infection. But after seeing an estimate of his bill, Jim left.

One week later, he died of an infection that could have been treated.

With 47 million Americans lacking health insurance, the stories add up.

Cicily Janus, former web editor for Opium, and author of two forthcoming books- Sick and Tired: An Oral History of America’s Health Care War and The New Face of Jazz, also fries a mean piece of chicken.

Writer M.J. Nicholls complains about magazines who don’t accept everything “good” that comes their way.  He’s finished with magazines like decomP and elimae because they send form rejections. With regard to PANK he says:

I DON’T SEE WHY the site publishes LESS than it RECIEVES. Surely the basic rules of SUPPLY and DEMAND apply here? If a slue of challenging and interesting work is offered – publish it. Give the reader a CHOICE. Stop setting your own agenda and being so FUCKING FUSSY.

I shall… leave it at that.

WORDS THAT SHOULD DIE AMONG OTHERS:

paradigm     very     salient
zany          droll   hopefully   excited
nonplus  risible    gender     guy
Fernando Pessoa   paradigmatic clarity

Submissions I receive most often and I’m most tired of reading are:

Stories about heterosexual sex (often violent) (usually written by women)
Stories about drugs/drinking (often cruel) (always by men)
Stories about having bad jobs and being proud of it (mostly narcissistic) (always by men)
Stories about detached husbands (mostly domestic issues that don’t seem that difficult to overcome) (usually by women)
Stories about breaking up (usually based on sex) (usually by men)
Stories about not really getting God (usually involve parents) (usually by men)

It’s very hard to handle these topics in an interesting way. 

It’s too bad there’s nothing else in the world to write about.